Image courtesy of National Novel Writing Month.
One month. Twenty four blog posts. Over 20,000 words. And one writing challenge successfully completed.
I am proud to announce that after thirty days of hard work, I’ve completed the NaNoWriMo Writing Challenge ‘Pants-Style’! You can find all of the posts under the NaNoWriMo2017 tag here on the blog, but right now, I really want to talk about the journey.
I’ll be brutally honest; when I first started this challenge, I didn’t expect to finish. I predicted that I’d write for maybe a week before running out of inspiration. Or I’d get to my vacation in the middle of the month and lose all motivation. From previous experience, I know that I sometimes struggle with writers block when I set a quantity goal on writing, and I thought I would run into that for sure. But instead, I surprised even myself.
Once I started writing though, I kept coming up with more and more topics I wanted to address. It totally helped that Blizzcon came out right as I enacted this challenge as it gave me boatloads of new content to cover, but even without that, I still think I could have filled the month. I had forgotten, but there are so many factors in this game and the community surrounding the game that I want to talk about long form. Heck, I still have a list of blog ideas left over from the month!
The only thing I found myself short on was time. I won’t lie, quite a few of the posts you can now read were written in the small hours of the night. I was writing in between classes or working out paragraphs in my head at extracurriculars. The tight requirement (a post every day with only two breaks per week) combined with my already busy real-life schedule meant that almost every spare moment was spent writing or preparing to write. It was exhilarating!
Unfortunately, it was also unsustainable. As you can see by the fact that this post is coming out several days into December, I’m just too busy to write a blog post almost every single day for a period of time longer than a month. I’d have to give up sleep if that were the case. I may eventually reach a stage in my life where that is a realistic goal, but for now, the rapid-fire posting of November will probably be a once in a blue moon thing.
I have to say it – and usually I don’t say it – but I am so incredibly proud of what I accomplished. I wrote a blog post per day for a month, an entire month, and I didn’t cop out. I didn’t take the easy road, I didn’t quit when the going got tough, I didn’t shirk away. That is pretty gosh darn awesome! Being the perfectionist that I am, it’s not often that I come out of something feeling like I performed to the best of my ability. There’s usually always that little something that I felt I could have done better, or that one area that I slacked. But today, looking back on the month of November, I can truly say that I gave this my all. And that is all I could have ever wanted.
Now what do we do now? Well, write of course! I’ll probably settle back into a once or maybe twice a week posting schedule, depending on what’s happening in the World of Warcraft and the World of Pants. I want to get out some more narrative style stuff (one of the few goals I had during NaNoWriMo which did not occur) along with the editorial pieces I typically write. But really, I just want to keep doing this at a much more relaxed pace. After the sprint, it’s time for the leisurely jog.
Before I wrap up for today, I want to quickly highlight some of the best things that Yotaan and I posted over the crazy month of November. There’s been a ton of content in the past thirty days so, no doubt, some of this was probably lost in the flood. Here’s some of my favorite works!
Tin Foil Hat: Battle for Azeroth
My working theory on what Battle for Azeroth will hold. I still don’t buy it that we’re just going to be fighting each other the entire time!
Leveling Guide: Legion Invasions
A quick guide on how to effectively level up from 100-110! One of my guildies has already gotten an alt up by this method and he thoroughly endorses it!
Four Year Anniversary!
We celebrated our four year blogiversary!
I am a Rose: A Visual Story
A visual story out in Val’sharah… I won’t spoil any more.
Crazy Raid Tales: The Mysterious Monk
One of the crazier raiding tales I’ve collected over the years, involving a monk who may or may not be Batman (or the Joker).
And of course, the pieces written by my wonderful father!
Legion or How I Learned to Love PvP Again
A write-up on how Legion PvP has been treating Yotaan. (Check out my response post here!)
Better Long Term Legion Goals
Yotaan showing up my goals by posting his own Better Long Term Legion Goals.
Growing up in Azeroth 